From day one of our arrival in the Barossa Valley in 2004 we knew we wanted to be heavily involved with making Mataro. We have since made many wines while also using Mataro in many blends.
Mataro has distinctive qualities that shine in warm growing regions and it may be that the most favourable global location is the Barossa Valley. It is commonly said, and likely factual, that many Barossa Valley Shiraz from the 1940s had a backbone addition of Mataro. This makes sense as Mataro was used for making fortifieds and several large vineyards of Mataro bush vines dating back to the 1890s still bear excellent fruit.
Alas in the 1980s it was hard to sell Barossa wines, and this initiated a vine pull scheme and many growers took compensation by ripping out unwanted varieties such as Mataro. This starkly reminds us of the ups and downs of the wine business. The way to stop this happening again is to increase the popularity of this very tasty variety.
